Cannot Update AppStore Hangs

This procedure will delete certain temporary and cache files used by system processes. The files are automatically generated and don't contain any of your data. Occasionally they can become corrupt and cause problems such as yours.

Back up all data before proceeding.

Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:

/var/folders/zz

Right-click or control-click the highlighted line and select

Services ▹ Reveal in Finder (or just Reveal)

from the contextual menu.* A folder should open with a subfolder named "zz" selected. Move that subfolder to the Trash. You may be prompted for your administrator login password. Restart the computer and empty the Trash.

*If you don't see the contextual menu item, copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. In the Finder, select

Go ▹ Go to Folder...

from the menu bar and paste into the box that opens by pressing command-V. You won't see what you pasted because a line break is included. Press return.

Hi,

i do the same thing as you mention after move zz folder into the trash. I restart the macbook but when the login screen appears and i entered the password.

the progression bar stuck at about 40%. what to now i tried to re-reinstall the os through recovery mode but still its stuck at the 50% now on the same.

Please help me out what to do now.

Thanks.

Adding my thanks, Linc. Worked perfectly.

Hi, hadi_xman!

I've had the same problem yesterday - after moving the /var/folders/zz folder to Trash and restarting i've got the hanging startup screen with Apple logo and the progression bar stuck at about 40% or 50%. By the way, it was impossible to boot in safe mode, but the recovery tool (Cmd-R after turn-on) was still working. Re-installing the OS through it gave nothing.

You'll need at least 16 GB USB-Flash drive (or HDD/SSD), an internet connection and your user password to perform the recovery.

Enter the recovery tool after start-up and install the OS using internet connection on the USB-Drive. It took about 30 min for me. Note, that in my case Mac stuck at the end of the installation process - I just turned it off (holding the power button for 10 sec) and after turning it on again the "new" system boots normally from the USB. The boot from the Macintosh HD was still impossible for that moment and even the disk/permissions repair procedure from "new" OS gave nothing.

Now, the idea is to move the deleted /var/folders/zz from trash to it's native location.

At first you'll need to make the hidden folders visible. Enter the terminal and paste the

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -boolean true ; killall Finder

string to it, then press Enter. Now you have everything in sight.

Go to Macintosh HD/Users/*Username*/Trash folder (click "Open in new tab" in Finder to open it) - hopefully you'll see the previously deleted "zz" folder. If it is read only and can't be opened, then right-click on it, select the "Get Info" button and make the "Read & Write" privileges for "System", "Wheel" and "Everyone" in "Sharing & Permissions" there. To do this, unlock the window by clicking on the padlock icon in the right-down corner and enter the user password.

I've got five subfolders in "zz" folder in trash, that were named like:

zyxvpxvq6csfxvn_n00000b000002r

zyxvpxvq6csfxvn_n00000bh00002w

zyxvpxvq6csfxvn_n00000s0000068

zyxvpxvq6csfxvn_n00000sm00006d

zyxvpxvq6csfxvn_n000006w00001q

Make sure to copy them in a safe place (on the USB drive, for example).

After that go to Macintosh HD/Private/Var/Folders/zz hidden folder (NOT the same located on your USB!) and check it. I've got all the mentioned subfolders in it and another one with the different name. Delete all of the subfolders which names are identical to those you've got from trash before and leave all of the other subfolders. Then paste the previously saved (in a safe place) subfolders in the "zz" folder.

Go to "Startup Disk" app and check the Macintosh HD to boot from (NOT the USB) and press restart.

After that you'll get your original OS normally boot.

That worked for me.

This works on El Capitan as well

Hi Linc Davis. I had a similar problem. I got a corrupted Software update file (for OSX 10.11.1). I could redownload the update, the update was successful. However, the corrupted file was stored in 1 of those subfolders under zz: /var/folders/zz

I deleted the whole zz subfolder, but I could not empty the trash after restarting. It said "The operation can’t be completed because the item “C” is in use.". If I chose "delete immediately", it said "The operation can’t be completed because an unexpected error occurred (error code -8072).)

I have also tried using the terminal: sudo rm -rf ~/.Trash/* .

The file can not be emptied from the trash. Would you please suggest a method for this issue?

Thank you very much

Same-thing happened to me, just return the file back to the zz folder. The corrupted files should have been deleted, and the app store should work.

Hi AzureXIII, thanks for your suggestion.

I have just tried to restore with my latest Time Machine backup (I took Linc's advice and created one before I delete the zz subfolder). Fortunately, the corrupted file is gone now, not in the Trash, not in /var/folders/zz . I have no idea how this happened.

The Time machine backup was created before I delete that subfolder, so I believe that Time Machine did not backup the corrupted file for some reason. Any idea why this is the case? 🙂

The instructions to delete the zz folder applied to Yosemite, and are not suitable for El Capitan. If you're running El Capitan, followed those instructions, and now can't empty the Trash, take either Step 1 or Step 2 below (not both.)

Step 1

Restore from the backup you made before moving the folder to the Trash. If you backed up with Time Machine, follow these instructions.

Step 2

This procedure will temporarily disable System Integrity Protection, a security feature of OS X that is preventing the Trash from being emptied. After you empty the Trash, the feature will be re-enabled. Nothing else will be changed.

Start up in Recovery mode. In the OS X Utilities screen, select Get Help Online. A copy of Safari will launch. While in Recovery, you'll have no access to your history or bookmarks, but you won't need them. Load this web page.

Triple-click anywhere in the line below to select it:

csrutil disable

Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C.

Quit Safari. You'll be returned to the OS X Utilities screen.

Select

Utilities ▹ Terminal

from the menu bar. A Terminal window will open. Paste into the window by pressing the key combination command-V.

Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear below what you entered. If it doesn't appear, press return.

Quit Terminal to return to the main screen.

Restart as usual. You should now be able to empty the Trash. As soon as you've done that, start up in Recovery mode again and load this page in Safari. Run the following command in Terminal as before:

csrutil enable

Restart as usual again.

When trying to solve this issues with App store. Itried to trash the zz folder and it wouldn't because items were missing. error code -43 do you know what it means?

Thanks to this procedure my Mac is back up and working! Thanks!